Additional menu

Pamela DeNeuve

Lawyer & Law Firm Peak Performance Strategist

Lawyer of the Week, Episode 3, Melbourne, Australia

posted on

Share
Tweet
Pin
0 Shares

George Beaton

Beaton Research + Consulting

Author of: Remaking Law Firms, Why and How

Here are Links for George Beaton and his books as well.

  1. American Bar Association Publishing to order Remaking Law Firms: Why & How
  2. Amazon to order an e-copy of NewLaw NewRules
  3. Read more about Dr George Beaton’s work on the clients of law and other professional services firms here.

 

Interview Transcript

 Pamela: Welcome to Lawyer of the Week. I am very pleased today to have Dr. George Beaton from Melbourne, Australia.

Dr. George Beaton has held senior academic positions in the medical, business and law facilities of leading universities in South Africa and Australia. George is regarded as an authority on professional services industries and their firms, particularly law firms.

His research interest is the imperative for law firms to remake their business models on the subject of which he wrote a NewLaw, New Rules in 2013 and Remaking Law Firms, Why and How. The latter book was published by The American Bar Association in 2016.

George consults to professional services firms in Australia, New Zealand, Asia, U.K., United States and Canada.

Welcome George, we are so glad to have you as the lawyer of the week today.

George: It’s my great pleasure, Pamela.

Pamela:       What time is it there for you?

George:  It’s now ten o’clock in the morning.

Pamela: Okay, it’s nighttime here for me. My first question is when and what made you decide to write your book?

George:  The book to which I think you are referring is Remaking Law Firms which is a major work published by the American Bar Association. It was written in response to my first book, NewLaw New Rules, which was the first time in the world anybody had recognised the NewLaw business model and understood how it differed from traditional law firms. The NewLaw model in my book offers clients many advantages over the traditional law firm model (which we now call BigLaw). And, importantly it offers to the owners of the traditional (i.e. BigLaw) model firm, opportunities to, in my language, ‘remake itself’ in response to the many challenges the model has. So it was in response and answer to your question, I decided to write Remaking Law Firms “To give partners and attorneys in the traditional law firms a big wakeup call, and answer the question ‘What do we do about it?’ in practical ways.

That’s why I wrote the book with the emphasis not only on why you should do it, but how you should do it. What are the practical strategies that you can adopt over a number of years to improve the operating efficiency and client effectiveness of your law firm?

Pamela: That’s really a great contribution that you made with both of your books George. Who is the perfect referral to your business?

George:  The perfect referral is a law firm that has seen the light, and who understands that the partnership needs to mobilize itself to start making changes. This is not because there is smoke coming under the door and there’s a sense of great emergency, but because over the next five to ten years, if they don’t start changing now and remaking themselves, the firm will progressively become less relevant to clients and therefore to the attorneys that work in it and the partners that own it. So, my target readership is firms that want to make the change and who are seeking guidance on what to do.

Pamela: Can you tell us a little bit about your biggest wins and challenges in the work that you do?

George:  Some of my most rewarding client experiences have been with the largest law firms, the very big ones. I’ve had the privilege to work with two of them in Chicago, London and Shanghai. Both of them are represented with offices in Australia. I’ve worked with their executive committees to get a really deep grasp of what it means to take institutions that are decades and generations old, preserve the best of those traditions and legacies, and start to make the changes which will ensure their continuing relevance to clients.

Pamela:  That’s really good. I see it myself, so I do know that there are a lot of firms that are steeped in those old firm cultures. To hear that you’re able to work with some of the biggest farms and help them to see the light, it is very encouraging.

George: Yes, I don’t think it’s so much their size, clearly for persons like myself and my colleagues in our consulting firm, working with these big names is immensely ego enhancing, if I may say so, but some of our most progressive and determined firms are small with 50 or fewer attorneys. You don’t have to be large and on the world stage to seize these opportunities and to apprehend these threats. It really is a function of the vision and the insight of the leaders. When they get it, then there’s an opportunity for them to persuade and help their partners get the message and act to remake themselves.

Pamela:    It’s good news to hear that George. What legacy do you want to leave in your practice and your consulting firm?

George: I’d like to leave a group of people to continue the work, adding value to our clients and researching. We are very committed to our own proprietary research in the industry, hence my writings. Our research among the clients of these BigLaw firms, understanding what makes clients tick, why they are changing and how they’re becoming more demanding of what they expect is world-leading.

I’d like that to continue as the next generation comes along and brings its new skill set, it’s digital know-how and fresh eyes. The Millennial generation of attorneys is very different the previous generations in the way they view the profession of law and practice of law and the need to remake the psyche of attorneys.

Pamela: That’s good. Tell me one thing aside from business that you do in your spare time to relax?

George: My wonderful wife and business partner Margaret and I are very keen Australian native gardeners. We have a seven acre property where we toil in the field, so to speak, to put back the native bush and fight to reduce weeds and look forward to the spring which is a couple of months away; we will have a wonderful show of Australian wild flowers.

Pamela: That’s wonderful and I’m so glad to have here with us today George. We really appreciate the work that you’re doing. It makes a big difference out there in the world. There’s a lot of upheaval going on in the legal profession. There are a lot of initiatives that are getting ready to come down the pike with Patrick Krill, I don’t know if you’re familiar with that work. So there are a lot of shakeups. With you at the helm here and making a difference all over the world, we really value and appreciate the work you’re doing.

George: It’s my great pleasure to have been with you. Thank you for inviting me, Pamela.

Pamela: Thank you, George, I really appreciate it.

 

Contact Pamela DeNeuve

I love helping lawyers and law firms increase profits

email me to schedule an appointment

pamela@pameladeneuve.com

 

 

Share
Tweet
Pin
0 Shares

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply

Quotes from our Lawyer of the Week

  • I am here to protect the human rights and I will do the best in my capacity to do so.
    Diana Constantinidou
  • I love this work. I really do. To me, especially now more than ever, we need a strong news media. It’s not just a business. It’s part of our democracy.
    Edward Birk
  • You don’t have to be large and on the world stage to seize these opportunities and to apprehend these threats. It really is a function of the vision and the insight of the leaders. When they get it, then there’s an opportunity for them to persuade and help their partners get the message and act to remake themselves.
    George Beaton
  • I did not intend to create this legacy, but I see the ripple effects of it, and it’s so meaningful to me. I think that through the podcast, I’m also hoping to create a legacy of service to the profession.
    Okeoma Moronu
  • That’s one of the things that I find very satisfying; building bridges between people from different countries, working closely with them and seeking those deeply satisfying relationships that are created in cross-border trade and investment facilitation.
    John Grimley
  • I’m very lucky to have a family and a wife that absolutely just creates a life that’s there and that one can go to. I think about the stress that we experience in our work, that is the best we can offer. So I really live for that. It’s something to be grateful for.
    Nic Swart
  • The legacy that I want to leave in the work that I’m doing is having made a difference and having hopefully spearheaded some type of meaningful change in the culture of the legal profession, as it relates to addiction and mental health specifically.
    Patrick Krill
  • It’s not so much my practice that I want to make a difference in, but I want to know that I left the legal professional a little bit better than I found it.
    Courtney Wylie
  • the real reality is some of the lawyers, some of the law firms, are going to be left behind because they’re not moving into the current reality where they can’t just rely on referrals.
    Montina Portis
  • When you take a lawyer out of the system, you take the voice and the ability of the people to protect themselves from overreaching government and overreaching organizations out the equation.
    Ian Connor Bifferato
  • I think a lot of attorneys are very, obviously, economically driven, which is fine, because we all need to make a living. But, at the end of the day, I also think that we are in this profession to give back and I would like to see that happen to a greater degree.
    Dr. Jeanne-Mari Reteif
  • "I would like my clients to think of me as of being a valuable resource to them and a knowledgeable resource that helped them protect their business and the most valuable assets of their business, which is their inventions, their ideas, their brand and that they remember me as somebody they could go to at any time to help them protect their intellectual property assets.
    Crystal T. Broughan
  • The person I’m looking for is the one who is going to come along and say ok; we can’t just tweak what we do with law; we have to radically re-invent it.
    Ken Grady
  • So you have to be that person who is challenged again and again so that you will grow as an expert.
    Dr. Peter MacMillan
  • I always tell my clients and my friends and colleagues, it’s a two-way road. You know- you give, and you receive, you give back, and it keeps going that way. It’s wonderful.
    Fernanda Alem-Freitas
  • In terms of successes, I will tell you, having done this, I’ve gone much further and made more connections and more friends and more inroads into the industry much earlier in my career than I ever could have possibly imagined.
    Gene Quinn
  • my thinking was that I really need to understand what clients really wanted. So in order to really do a good job, I needed to find out what moves them, what kept them up at night.
    Silvia Hodges Silverstein
  • So when we talk about a legacy, it’s a legacy that people to this day tell me — oh, I remember working with your Grandfather and he was such an upright man. Wow, let’s hope they say that about me.
    Jordan W. Charness
  • this answer made me to become a lawyer instead of a mathematician.
    Anandavasagan K.
  • What I want to try to do is create the beacon, or the light toward, developing law firm culture, as in the legal profession culture in general...where they do find a sense of meaning, purpose, connection, joy and want to stay in the profession.
    Anne Brafford
  • it is my goal to try to increase diversity within our profession, and even for as long as I’m here, I will advocate for the inclusion of different perspectives, different peoples, and different ideas that can make this world a better place.
    Robert Johnson
  • I have learned a lot of things the hard way and if I can help others sort of avoid the mistakes I’ve made and have the vision I lacked, then that’s how I want to help
    Frank Ramos
  • "I’m sort of traditional with an edge. I have respect for tradition. I have respect for history, but I’m also very inquisitive. I like to, you know, sort of architect things.
    Mark A. Cohen
  • I am all or nothing. I believe that the world has enough mediocre people. I had a mentor tell me that once and I give 110% to everything I do.
    LaKeisha Randall
  • You’ll never know how high that peak can be unless you find recovery, and with recovery, anything is possible
    Brian Cuban
  • Being able to live and work anywhere in the world. And we do live, you know- we live in one of the most beautiful places in the world, in County Cork, Ireland now.
    Walt Hampton
  • You know, the best thing that anyone could possibly do is think about what’s important to them and get back to that really basic thing. Personally, professionally, financially. You know, where would you like to be? Because you can be there if you take a couple steps, you know? And it just- it can be incremental
    Bridget Venus Grimes
  • The people I represent have their own families and their own spouses and I see that vividly through my own experiences and trying to help them. I often try to, although perhaps not the easiest thing to do, but try to put myself into their shoes and approach a case with that regard.
    Mark A. Torres
  • My legacy really is to try to enhance the wellness of the members of our profession and to open up this dialog.
    Heidi K. Brown
  • At the end of my days, I want people to look back and say, "Yes, he really did make the world a better place and here are some concrete examples of places where he's influenced people, or influenced organizations, or cultures." So, if I can do that and leave that to the world, then I think I've done a pretty good job.
    Maurice L. Rabb
  • Pamela helped brought us a $12MM deal and was a key player to help finalize the negotiations. She was a valuable investment for our firm with a magnificent return on our investment.
    Bill L., Chairman of Litigation
  • I was on the verge of losing it. I felt confused and had no idea why I was practicing law in the first place. Pamela helped me to regain my enthusiasm and grow my practice enjoy my life again.
    Lewis M., Partner
  • I have worked as an in-house attorney for 20+ years with major corporations. I hired Pamela during a transition in my career. When I began working with Pamela, I needed clarity and direction as I forged a new path. Through Pamela's unique coaching techniques, I learned a tremendous amount about myself and what I wanted out of life. She helped me put plans in place, encouraged me and held me accountable for taking necessary actions. Coaching is clearly not just a business for Pamela. She truly cared about me and repeatedly went above and beyond to help me achieve the goals I set for myself. Pamela is highly knowledgeable and accomplished and I trust her judgment and coaching. I would highly recommend her to anyone who is looking to make a job or career change.
    Renee Cogdell Lewis
  • Why should only sports figures get coaches? I represent whistleblowers in highly complicated litigation cases. The work is stressful and I can't afford to be distracted or unfocused. Maybe some lawyer out there finds that easy, but if any lawyer/mom/wife does, I'd like to meet her. I needed to be at my peak ALL the time so I hired Pamela DeNeuve as my coach and -- wow! Hiring Pamela is like having someone right there with me in my practice as coach, mentor, confidant, and troubleshooter. I am on my A+ game thanks to Pamela.
    Lee Wallace
  • Pamela DeNeuve works with powerful men and women who look to the world like they have it all together. So that includes everyone who is successful because we all have skeletons in our closet. We all have an area of life that is painful or frustrating. While I looked like I had it all, a beautiful wife, a son who I have a great relationship and a long-time financial career, a growing business as a motivational speaker, something was missing. Something was off and I couldn't put my finger on it. Working with Pamela DeNeuve is one of the best things I have ever done. Her insight, her showing me the blind spots that I tried to ignore or avoid was an awakening. I have regained my enthusiasm again. I wake up with the wonder and excitement I had lost as the years wore on. I highly recommend Pamela DeNeuve's 8-hour intensive session. You will make quantum leaps in your career, increase your income and your wife will become the love of your life again.
    Tom Heitz
  • Any lawyer or law firm who want to expand their practice, increase client base, or re-ignite your love of the law will be wise to work with Pamela DeNeuve as your business/marketing coach. She has more than 25 years of experience working with AM100 law firms, small firms, and individual lawyers across the United States, in Asia, and South Africa. Pamela understands all aspects of the legal profession. She understands the challenges that we attorneys face. I retained Pamela to help with business development and some special projects in my First Amendment/Communications law practice. Almost immediately, I started to once again see opportunities in the challenges rather than the other way 'round. Practicing law is more enjoyable because of this work with Pamela. Asking for help is sometimes the hardest ask of all. After working with Pamela for her help, I'm glad I asked. I highly recommend her to any attorney or firm.
    Edward Birk